Reply #29: Your story sounds very similar to mine, Beam Me Up. [View All]

[Ladyhawk]

The only difference is that I'm sexually dysfunctional rather than gay. Had I turned out to be gay, it would have been even worse. I am so sorry that you had to go through so much because of your sexual orientation. I apologize to you because I cannot apologize to the gay people that I hurt when I was a fundy. One of them died of AIDS years ago. :( The hatred toward gays in the fundy religion is sickening and I bought into it. Mass psychosis, indeed.

I drank the Kool-Aid to some extent, but I was always a "good little girl" who never got into trouble. As I grew, I also noticed the hypocrisy. When I became depressed at age 18, I blamed myself when God didn't help me. It took me awhile to figure out that I wasn't the problem; God was--at least, the God I had worshiped during my life. The God of the fundies is bloodthirsty, irrational and cruel. No wonder I thought I deserved punishment. The root of every problem I had could be traced directly back to fundamentalism.

It took me years, but I finally gave up on fundamentalism, then on religion altogether, then on the Republican world view. In November, I told my family to go take a flying leap, which has mostly been a positive move. I nearly gave in recently and asked them back into my life. I'm facing surgery at the end of the month. The pain and lack of support is really hurting. I have to do it by myself, though. If I can get through this without them, I can get through anything. (I hope.)

I've started over, carefully building my life on principles of a new kind of morality that doesn't adhere to dogma. Instead of asking, "What would Jesus do?" I ask, "What should Ladyhawk do?" Like everyone else, I make mistakes and muddle through as best I can. But it's better than waiting on a non-existent god to intervene.